Friends
by UnholyTomahawk
Summary: A different turn of events on the scene where Naruto walks past Sasuke as he is sitting on the dock overlooking the lake.  One-shot at the moment.  Not Yaoi.


A/N: Okay, so I've had this idea stuck in my head for awhile now and so I've decided to finally write it down. Just a twist on the scene where Naruto is walking by Sasuke as he sits on the dock by the lake. Hope you enjoy it!

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters portrayed in this fic. I am merely writing for my own enjoyment and not for any form of profit.

Friends

_Demon Brat!_

_Who do you think you are being here?_

_Why does the Hokage keep you alive?_

_YOU'RE BETTER OFF DEAD! FUCKING DEMON!_

An eight year old Naruto walked along a levy overlooking a lake as these voices entered his mind once again. It was the same everyday of his life. Every day he would get up with his cheery disposition and act like nothing bothered him and do his best to be friendly to everyone, but in the end it never mattered. Each time they called him a demon. Each time they told him he should be dead instead of alive. The only people that showed him any kind of kindness at all were the Hokage and those people at his favorite ramen stand.

"They probably only do it for their business though…" He muttered to himself as he trudged along.

Today was a relatively good day for him all things considered. He hadn't wound up in the hospital or been beaten up. His stomach was actually fairly full at the moment from scavenging, and he even felt that he had made progress with his "training." But all that didn't matter right now…

"No matter how good of a day I seem to have, these thoughts always seem to invade as I walk home alone…" He once again muttered to himself. He usual cheery disposition replaced by what could be said to be the real Naruto at the moment. But then again, he himself wasn't even sure what the real him was like anymore. Not after having his mask on for his entire life.

As he continued his walk along the levy, he noticed a black haired kid sitting on a dock staring off into the water. _Huh… so he is here again today to. He is always there looking out at the water. Ever since…_

The kid was none other than Sasuke Uchiha. Naruto knew him from the Academy and had kind of pegged him as his unofficial rival. He was better at everything. Kunai, Shuriken, Taijutsu. He was labeled a prodigy, and Naruto hated him for it in the beginning, especially since it appeared to him that Sasuke had everything. A family, a clan. A father. A mother. An older brother…

That all changed when Naruto noticed he stopped coming to class for awhile. Sasuke had never been absent and for him to miss so many days… it was kind of unnerving for him. He had asked the Hokage about it one day, but the man refused to tell him anything. But that didn't stop him from hearing the rumors or the whispers around town. And eventually, he had found out. Sasuke had lost everything. His clan had been wiped out of existence, and Sasuke was the only survivor.

Naruto actually stopped his walk for a second to look down at the last Uchiha as thoughts ran through his mind. _He has spent every evening since he got out of the hospital on that dock…_

He remembered seeing him the first time he came back to the academy. It was probably a week after he first stopped coming. Everything about him had changed. He had always been somewhat stuck up and arrogant and kept somewhat to himself, but that wasn't what Naruto had noticed. It was his eyes that Naruto had first noticed. Sasuke's eyes had once been filled with such determination and strength, but that first day back, Naruto saw no life in them.

_His eyes reminded me of my own… Just in a different way… _

Naruto forced himself to start walking again. It would do no good to sit and think on these things with the way he was now. As he continued walking he allowed himself one last glance back, and that glance caused him to stop.

Sasuke was looking back up at him and their eyes locked as Naruto came to a stop. For a split second, Naruto couldn't tell what expression he had on his face, but he quickly snapped out of it and his mask instinctively kicked in as his faced turned into a kind of cocky grin as he pulled his eyes away from the Uchihas and looked up and forward in an arrogant and childlike fashion. He couldn't tell what Sasuke did, but he imagined it was some kind of sneer, and after a few minutes he allowed himself another look back to see Sasuke looking back out over the water.

"What an arrogant jerk… just keep going home…." He muttered to himself halfheartedly.

Naruto told himself that, but when he found himself walking again he found it to be in the direction of the last Uchiha and not towards his piece of crap apartment. He didn't know why he was going towards him, but his whole being was screaming at him to stop. He found himself unable to however, and before he knew it, he was standing before the Sasuke on dock.

If Sasuke knew he was there, he didn't show it. He just kept his gaze out over the water, seemingly uncaring about the rest of the world. This was the part about him that pissed Naruto off. How he could just completely ignore people around him.

"You know, it really isn't polite to ignore people."

Naruto didn't receive an answer. Sasuke just continued looking out over the water. It didn't even appear that had heard him at all. Naruto quickly began to lose his patience and before he knew it was back in his mask going full throttle.

"Okay you arrogant jerk! What is your problem? "Naruto yelled with a childish/arrogant look on his own face.

Sasuke however, chose not to respond once again. Keeping his firm gaze out over the lake he had been to everyday since he got out of the hospital. For his part, he was just ignoring the idiot that was Naruto Uzumaki. The dobe of his class held no interest to him and he was not in the mood to be challenged to another pathetic match that the blond always seemed to want to have.

The said blond wasn't going away however, and took to just glaring at the back of Sasuke's head as he stood over him. _I actually come down here and he decides to ignore me? Nobody ignores Naruto Uzumaki and gets away with it! _Naruto thought as he continued his glare.

"HEY!" Naruto once again yelled as his gaze hardened, "answer me or I'm going to kick your ass Uchiha!"

_He really isn't going to leave me alone…_ Sasuke thought as he heard the blond scream over him. He didn't do much for another several seconds before he calmly stood up, his gaze never leaving the water. _That dobe will never understand anything…_

Naruto watched as Sasuke stood up, thinking he finally got through to the Uchiha, but his next reply was cut short as Sasuke turned around and Naruto was once again met with those eyes. Those empty and barren eyes. Naruto could almost feel the strength leave him as Sasuke walked past him without saying a word.

"….just…like me…." Naruto whispered to himself as his own empty gaze stared out over the water that had been Sasukes current fixation until a few moments ago.

Sasuke came to a halt a few steps past Naruto as he heard those words escape the blonds lips. At first, he didn't really feel anything, and then anger started to boil up within him. _Just like him? We are nothing alike! He is an orphan! He knows nothing of what I lost!_

"You know nothing." Sasuke said, finally deciding to speak up.

He turned around to face the blond that was the source of his rising anger only to have that said anger disappear and be replaced with confusion upon seeing the blond in front of him. After Sasuke had said that, Naruto had turned to face him, to watch him walk away just like everyone else. But instead Sasuke had turned around and their eyes locked once again.

Naruto was in a battle with himself at this point. Part of him just wanted to run. To continue on like he had been and to go on and prove his worth on his own. But after seeing those eyes again… part of him just wanted to stay. To talk to the boy in front of him. The boy that had become so much like himself. The only other person he knew that had the eyes of loneliness like that.

Sasuke on the other hand, was confused and shocked. The loudmouth blond that had just been there seemed to have vanished and been replaced with the one in front of him. One that he didn't want to see. He had always seen Naruto as a loud idiot. One that could never be a true ninja and as someone that just craved attention for the sake of it. But the usual bright blue eyes of the Naruto he had come to tolerate had been transformed to the dull almost lifeless ones in front of him. He had never seen Naruto look so…alone…

"I know what it means to be alone…Sasuske…" Naruto said as he allowed himself to fully come out of his mask in front of someone for the first time in his young life. No stupid antics. No loudmouth bantering. Just the honest truth from a child who never had anything, to one that lost everything.

Sasuke didn't truly know what to think at Naruto's answer. To be honest, the transformation from loud idiot to…this still had Sasuke stunned. But he could see it in Naruto's own eyes… the same eyes that looked at him in the mirror every morning and night… his eyes… Whether he wanted to admit it to himself or not, the dobe knew loneliness. And as he thought back on all the times he had paid attention to Naruto, he could see it. Naruto always walking home alone. Always playing alone at the playground. Always being told no by other kids that he asked to play. _So he knows what it means to be alone, but that doesn't mean that he knows me._

"Your lonely Naruto, I get it. But that doesn't mean you know me. That doesn't mean you know what its like to lose everything you held dear! You have always been alone! Always! You have no idea what it means to lose somebody, cause you never had anyone!" Sasuke said with an increasingly steady voice. He didn't know why he started yelling, but by the end he was yelling. Why? Was he really that afraid to have something in common with somebody else…?

Naruto visibly flinched at what Sasuke said, but his eyes never left Sasukes. And it was seeing the depth in his eyes, the pain in them that caused Sasuke to break the eye contact.

"No… I never could imagine what it would be like to lose someone. Your right Sasuke… I've never had anyone. For as long as I can remember… I've been alone…" Naruto said in a voice barely above a whisper as Sasuke brought his gaze back up to meet his own. "And I never claimed to know you… only to understand the loneliness you feel… I have no idea what it feels like to lose everyone. To lose everything… And honestly… I hope I never do…. The truth is… I've wanted to talk to you for awhile… but I never could bring myself too… I could see your pain the first day you came back… the same pain I feel everyday… you have your pain of loss, we both have the pain of loneliness… and then my very own source of pain…."

As Naruto finished talking, his gaze turned towards the heart of the village. The village he loved with every being of his soul, yet the village that hated him with every fiber of their own.

Sasuke stood in front of him as he digested to blonds words. _Pain? Loneliness… Dobe….no….Naruto…just who are you exactly? _Sasuke honestly didn't know what to think of the blond before him anymore. _Understand the loneliness I feel…. My pain of loss…. But what did you mean by your own source of pain?_

Sasuke did his best to think back on all the times he had seen Naruto. The times inside and outside of the Academy. He remembered always seeing Naruto raise his hand in the beginning, but never be called. Seeing the instructors use an advanced taijutsu move they said they would use on everybody but then only use on him. The days he would go missing only to come back as if nothing had happened. The wide berth everyone seemed to give Naruto. The glares he always thought were from one of the blonds stupid pranks. _Is that your pain Naruto?_

Sasuke didn't know why he suddenly found himself interested in the blond before him. Maybe Naruto was right, maybe they were the same on some levels. But that didn't change the way things were.

"Maybe… you're not such a dobe after all…" Sasuke said as his eyes met Naruto's one last time before he turned around and began to walk back off the dock.

Naruto watched Sasuke slowly walk away from him and off the dock, but he didn't feel empty this time like he normally did. Because he saw that small spark once again in Sasukes eyes the last time their eyes locked. They may not be friends, they may not even like each other, but he could tell there was some measure of understanding between them now, just from those few minutes of talking.

"Hey, Sasuke!" Naruto yelled out as Sasuke reached the levi and began walking home.

Sasuke turned to look at Naruto once again who he could tell once again back to his old self.

"I'll see you bright and early at the Academy tomorrow! And I'm going to give you that asskicking you so rightly deserve! Believe it!" Naruto yelled as he gave Sasuke a bright smile as he stood with his hands on his hips. _It's been awhile since I've actually smiled cause I wanted too._

Sasuke couldn't help but let out a little snort at Naruto's little proclamation, but even so, he also couldn't stop the smile from forming on his face. The first true smile since the Uchiha Massacre.

"Yeah, okay dobe, whatever you say." Sasuke said as he began walking away once again.

"Haha, count on it Sasuke! Be ready tomorrow!" Naruto yelled as he ran up the levi and continued in the opposite direction towards his own apartment.

"Tomorrow then…Naruto." Sasuke replied without looking over his shoulder, but did give and uncharacteristic wave as he continued down the path to the Uchiha compound, a small smile still stuck on his face.

Naruto was kind of shocked at hearing Sasuke use his own name in such a manner, but in the end it only made is grin bigger as he went along his own path towards his apartment, this time, with much happier thoughts filling his head.

A/N: Well, there you have it. Hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Honestly, I planned this out as a one-shot, but as I was writing was thinking of all kinds of different ways I could turn it into a full length story. Tell me what you all think in a review and maybe I'll start a story off of it if a lot of people are interested. Or maybe I will just because I'm getting excited thinking about it. Lol. Anyway, tell me what you think! And if you are a fan of my Evangelion Fic Children of Destiny, sorry I haven't updated lately, but a new chapter will be out within the week! Until next time!


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